Foosball 2012 is another entry in the line of not-so-typical-for-a-console-game sports, like darts, bowling, pool, or golf that we have seen recently on the PlayStation Store. If you weren’t sure which platform to get the game on, we think you’ll appreciate that when you buy the game for PS3, you’ll get the PS Vita version for free and the other way around!

A lot of people ask us “Why foosball?” and we keep telling them “Why not?” Other games that wouldn’t seem to be well-suited to a console experience managed to capture the essence of those games, and we hope to do the same with Foosball 2012. It is not just about playing foosball, it’s about playing a quick, skill-based game, that is easy to handle, but difficult to master. A game with a great multiplayer component and entertaining single-player mode, lots of customizations and Leaderboards to keep track of where you and your friends are standing against the global competition.

If you own both the PS3 and PS Vita, you’ll also appreciate full cross-compatibility between the two platforms. Not only can play online against people on the other platform, but you’ll also have your saves automatically synchronized between your two PlayStation consoles. That way, you can enjoy Foosball 2012 in gorgeous 1080p, 60FPS beauty on your TV, then take it on the road with you on PS Vita and continue from where you left off.

Many of you also asked about the controls. You can either play using the DualShock controller, where the left stick controls the movements of the poles and the right stick shoots the ball (so you can precisely aim and control the power of the shot), or you can use PlayStation Move and play foosball just like the real thing! You can also use touch controls on Vita, if that’s more your speed.

Both the PS3 and PS Vita versions will come in the form of a free trial that you can upgrade to the full version, so you will be able to try the game before you buy it. Foosball 2012 will be $7.99, or $5.99 if you’re a PlayStation Plus member. Buying the game on PS3 will also let you download it for Vita for free, and the other way around.

2) No. The game runs at FullHD and 60fps. We were considering 3D, but that would limit the fps to 30. The game looks and plays much better at 60fps, so we decided to not do 3D.

3) Yes

4) There are 20 regular + 8 very hard matches, each placed in one of the world’s major cities. You play through all of them and each opponent gives you a reward for winning, like a new table or a new customization. You also get stars depending on how well you have played and stars are used to unlock some content, so you will be motivated to come back to already beaten opponents and play better.

5) 1 Gold, 4 Silver, 7 bronze. There are throphies for progressing through the World tour mode, others are skill-based, like scoring a goal with the goalkeeper, winning without receiving a goal, etc.

Voice chat is only enabled in the PS3 version and you can invite friends from your friend list. When starting an online room, you can make it a private room, so no one ,except those who were invited by you, can join.

Definitely getting this today.
So I think I now have 4 Vita games, and I don’t even have a Vita!
Sony should encourage other developers to follow this path. Eventually I’ll have a whole catalog of Vita games, and it’ll be only a matter of time until I won’t be able to resist buying a Vita.
Cross-platform purchases FTW!

Thanks again for all of the answers! That’s prompted a few more questions:

1. Any sort of customization options for tables/characters? I think taking a picture with the vita and using it as a table background would be awesome.

2. Is there ad-hoc play for the Vita version?

3. Any word on upcoming DLC?

4. I think I can rephrase the question from #2 a bit better. On the Vita, if you’re in a party, you’re able to join a friends game straight from the party using a little icon (look at Resistance Burning Skies and WipEout 2048 for examples). It’s in the manual right here: http://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/psvita/party/duringparty.html Do you guys support that?

Thanks again, I’ll probably have even more questions the more I think.

Left stick controls the movements of the poles and ball. So you can block, move the ball up and down, etc. Right stick shoots – you push it in the direction you want to shoot and it shoots (the more you push it, the the stronger the shot, so you can do anything from passes to super-powerful shots).

There are actually two more control settings if you don’t like this one. And of course, there’s always the Move ;-)

Thank you for the response. so i guess, the ball sticks to the poles. and you can push the shoulder buttons to move to the other pole you are controlling? right? hmmm. im buying:D sounds fun in multiplayer.

Foosball…REALLY PlayStation…You have a great portable system like PS Vita and all you can come up with is Foosball. You need to get better games out that have more action on them then what you are releasing. LIke a God of War…or a new version of Crash Bandicoot…something more challenging. Even better, convert some of the PS 3 games for the PS Vita. Stop making these lame games and get the good games out.

It sounds like you guys have ALL of the bases covered with this one…well done! As a PlayStation Plus member ($5.99 for me), a Move owner, and a Vita owner; I can’t think of any reason not to support your offering. Unbelievably I have never really even played Foosball (aside from perhaps a demo unit at a toy store or something), so I am really looking forward to trying it out, and supporting your efforts.

@wheelers1971, are you senile? This isn’t made by Sony. Are you suggesting Sony shouldn’t allow other developers to make games for the Vita until Sony themselves have made enough to your liking? My goodness, I want more Vita games, too, but why on earth would anybody be mad that non-Sony developers are making games on my favorite platform?

thanks Jakub. I’m gonna pick up the demo first just to make sure I like the gameplay and controls, but I’m confident I’ll be buying this one today. Is there a seemless automatic switch between poles, like do you automatically control the pole closest to the ball?

You control all the poles at once. Or, if you use two Move controllers, or switch to expert control settings, you control pairs of poles simultaneously. It sounds a bit strange, but it works really well once you try it.

Just downloaded the game and really like it! I have two suggestions though. 1: When I go to the “Unlocking” menu, some of the numbers are cut-off on my HDTV. Unless I’m missing it, this game could benefit from an option for people to change the size of game screen to make the numbers visible. 2: This is just a personal preference for me, but I would love an option to turn off the yellow/red streak that comes from ball when you shoot it. Overall, though, I’m having a blast and can’t wait to play the Vita version when I get my Vita in a few days!

The trophies for World Tour progress, that you unlocked on the other device, will unlock after you finish one match in the world tour.
Skill-based trophies, like scoring a goal using a goalkeeper must be achieved on both PS3 and PS Vita, to make it a bit more challenging ;-)

Before this came out, I couldn’t imagine how virtual foosball could have controls that would make it feel anything like the real game, but you guys really nailed it. I’ve been playing foosball for years, especially during the 2 years where there was a table for our lunch break at the place I worked. I love this game! Great work Grip Games!!

Now this game is fun! I played the demo all the way up to the last unlocked World Tour round (I think it was Level 6?) and I smoked all the opponents 5-0, and then 10-0 respectively until the final match… where the AI got 2 shots past me… finally the AI showed up and gave some effort, I guess, but I’m glad there’s at least 20 more rounds to go otherwise it would be too easy. But of course, multi-player is where this game will shine anyway. You’ve got my money Grip Games, I’m buying!

Hi Jakub, I bought the game last night on my Vita and I really enjoy it! It’s very addictive, but I had to stop playing so I wouldn’t go through all 20 of the World Tour matches in one night. I found the controls a bit confusing at first when trying the tutorials, but after a few minutes I got pretty comfortable with it and turned off the help arrows, which were a little confusing.

I’m glad I purchased the game – you guys did a great job. Looking forward to downloading it on my PS3 to see it on the big screen too. Good stuff!

I played this with Move last night and it works extremely well and is lots of fun.

Quick question – when playing 2 player local can we each use 2 Moves or do we have to just each use one? It seems like it would only ask to calibrate 2 Move controllers and not the 3rd and 4th so that’s probably my answer, but just wanted to check.

Looking forward to playing this on Vita too, but I am very impressed with the Move implementation. Nice job!

Bought it day one – at that Plus price, I couldn’t resist. And I love it! Easy to get used to and control, and hard to put down. Thanks, guys! My wife is happy, too, because she was a fan of the Friends TV show but didn’t want to replace our dining table.

HEYYY!
How is it cross-play but PS3 can NOT join any private match on a Vita, or other way around!???
Fix that as soon as possible, cuz thats like 3/4 of the job done!
Cuz is a REALLY good game, it just needs that!
GOOD WORK GUYS!

So… before I unlocked the full game, this game was playing great, but the multi-player is BROKEN, at least for me. And that’s what I was looking most forward too. Every online match I’ve had has been extremely glitchy. I don’t now if anyone else is having the same problems, but MANY times I’ve had the ball go into the goal – DEEP into the goal – and just bounce right out, not registering a goal. I’ve been screwed out of at least 7 or 8 goals this way so far, and on the flipside, there are times when the ball isn’t even close to the goal and it magically goes in somehow. It could be in the top corner of the table rolling slowly downward and then suddenly… it just appears in the back of the net and counts a goal. I hope this can get fixed because it completely ruins the purpose of playing online.

I also had the same problem that the guy above me had. Every time I tried to connect with a Vita player, it would say “Unable to connect to the remote player” or something like that.

Hey.
When you see a ball go into the goal and then back, that’s an effect of a latency between you and the other player. You see a goal, but the other player actually managed a last-moment save. When the game synchronizes a few miliseconds later, you see the ball bouncing off the goal.
Foosball is extremely fast game and even a latency of 30ms to 50ms, which is totally OK for most other games, can have such effects in this game.

We know it does not look great, but it is not cheating or a bug. The other player managed to catch the ball in time.

The same thing has happened to me where it looks like I’m scoring lots of goals that don’t count, or funny ones that go in randomly on either net. If it means the other player actually saved it, then that’s ok. I was worried some players had found out ways to exploit the game so hardly any goals get scored on them.

The multiplayer does seem very fast – faster than the single player (but I assume single-player gets faster when you get to the expert levels).

About the Private matches – if you can’t send a cross-platform invite, how could I set up a private match from my Vita with a PS3 player? I want to convince a friend to get the game, but he doesn’t have a Vita. This would be a great game to try out some cross-platform action. Can you tell me how to set up a match like this?

Thanks for replying to so many comments. It’s great to see you supporting the game.

The multiplayer is actually a bit slower then single player (ball speed, shot power), but when you meet players who just randomly shoot the ball like crazy, it gets fast. That’s like real life.

You can start a public match and wait for your friend to join it. If any other player joins before him, you can kick him and wait for your friend.

No problem with replying to so many comments. The game is out now, so there’s not much to do. What a better way to kill an afternoon ;-) (I am actually kidding, but being as close to our fans as we can is something I believe in).

I have had no luck connecting to any online game. I always get the same message similar to noted above “Unable to connect to the remote player” or “game ended by remote player”. I’ve tried with the PS3 and Vita and it always happens either right from the lobby or one time right when I hit X to launch the ball.

I don’t think there is a problem with my internet as I have NAT2 on all systems and my recent router upgrade fixed my download problems from PSN.

The PS3 probs were on launch day and the Vita was last night with admitably a weak wifi signal, but Resistance works fine from the same location in house so I don’t think that’s it either. Since the other guy mentioned the same issue I still think there could be some problem connecting between the different devices.

I’ll keep trying but if possible please see if there are any other reports of issues.

I agree with the other guy – I appreciate your quick and numerous replies. It says alot for you and your team.